Suspected unmarked graves found at Florida reform school known for allegations of rape and murder

The first beating Jerry Cooper sustained at the notorious Florida School for Boys involved him being thrown on a bed, tied down and whipped so hard that his body was lifted a foot and half every time the leather strap made contact.

A boy who was awake in a room nearby heard the violent and horrifying ordeal, counting 135 lashes.

“And every time that strap would come down, you could hear the shuffle on the concrete because their shoes would slide,” said Cooper, now 74, in an interview he gave back in October 2012. “And you could hear the shoosh, shoosh, bam.”

Cooper, who was 16 at the time, lost consciousness and nearly died. It was 1961.

Cooper’s story of violent beatings he sustained at the school have become common among the survivors who have come out in recent years, adding valuable clues as state investigators contend and wrestle with the recent shocking and chilling discovery of unmarked graves on the sprawling 1,400 acre site.

On Wednesday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis acknowledged the discovery of 27 possible unmarked graves, adding to the 55 confirmed graves found during an investigation in 2012. The newest possible graves were discovered by a contractor conducting a ground survey prior to a pollution clean up on a little under 2 acres of land at the school. The contractor, using ground-penetrating radar equipment, reported “27 anomalies” consistent with the depth and shape of graves.

Cooper was sent to the school after being caught stealing a car. Other kids were also charged with crimes, but some children simply had nowhere else to go, he said.

“A lot of orphans were there that did not have places at times and they were sent to Marianna,” Cooper told NPR. “They weren’t there for any crime whatsoever, but we had many, many boys who was there for smoking in school, that were incorrigible. We weren’t bad kids. We might have needed help in some respect. But that wasn’t the place to find it, I’ll tell you that right now.”

The school gained a reputation for rape, torture and the murder of young boys who were forced to live there, according to statements given by a group of survivors known as the “White House Boys,” a name taken from the small cinder-block building where thousands of beatings are believed to have taken place. The number of men who have publicly come out is now more than 400.

The White House Boys began telling their stories in the early 2000s, widely documented in a detailed 2009 investigation by the St. Petersburg Times. Survivors corroborated that segregated whippings rooms existed where guards would use a belt made of leather and metal to punish the boys. So severe were the punishments that the boys’ underwear would become meshed with their skin. One person said he saw one boy trapped in a running laundry dryer and believed he had been killed.

Others claim there was a “rape room” at the school where they were sexually abused by guards. Some of the children were as young as 9, according to witness accounts in the investigation.

Christmas gifts being distributed to African American boys at the School for Boys in Marianna, Florida, in the 1950s.

A law enforcement investigation was launched prior to the extensive news reporting by the St. Petersburg Times, finding no concrete evidence of a link between the deaths and the actions of the staff who worked there. No graves were opened during the investigation, but law enforcement did note in a report that 31 of the graves had been dug between 1914 and 1952.

“Some reports by former students stated that in addition to corporal punishment, they were also subjected to sexual abuse at the hands of former staff members or other students,” said an official 2010 report that investigated the spankings. “With the passage of over fifty years, no tangible physical evidence was found to either support or refute the allegations of physical or sexual abuse.”

In March 2010, the Florida State Attorney said that no charges would be filed, citing lack of evidence.

The school was shut in 2011 after immense pressure was placed on the legislature in Tallahassee, which is just one hour east of Marianna, the city where the school was located since opening in 1900.

Of the first 55 graves that were discovered, the remains of 51 boys have been found, according to studies made by a team of anthropologists from the University of South Florida. The USF team has been at the site on and off since 2012, but only recently did the team gain full access to the entire property.

A majority of the work being done by the USF team is at the Boot Hill cemetery, which was designated as an African-American burial ground during the segregation era. Segregation ended at the school in 1966.

The remains of the first boys discovered in 2012, which mostly consisted of bones, teeth and artifacts, underwent DNA testing, enabling researchers to make seven certain matches and a further 14 presumptive identifications.

Those remains were returned to families where possible, but most were reburied.

The number of official deaths at the school appears to be disputed because of incomplete documentation. The bodies of those who were officially recorded have not all been accounted for at the school’s cemetery, while some of those found in the unmarked graves are not noted in documentation, according to investigators. For example, a boy by the name of George Owen, who was reported missing in 1940, was found in the first batch of unmarked graves.

Many children at the school were reported to have died under less sinister circumstances. Eight boys died in a fire in 1914, while others died from flu and pneumonia. Some runaways were also shot.

Gov. DeSantis has asked state officials to work closely with anthropologists to establish if the anomalies are in fact unmarked graves. If it proves to be true, any remains will also undergo DNA testing and identification.

Jackson County plans to eventually use the land to build a distribution and manufacturing center, as well as a training center for people with autism. The Florida Cabinet voted on the proposal in December.

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